Last week, Cashill appeared on TheDoveTV to promote the book and was asked what he thought about the possibility that the Justice Department might file civil rights charges against Zimmerman in the death of Trayvon Martin. Cashill was not supportive, to say the least, primarily because "George Zimmerman may have been the least racist person in the state of Florida."

In fact, Cashill stated, Zimmerman was a civil rights hero and prosecuting him "would be like going after Nelson Mandela on civil rights, or Mother Theresa":

In an interview with NewsMax’s Steve Malzberg yesterday, Gun Owners of American executive director Larry Pratt said that Trayvon Martin was killed because he had a “broken family.”

Pratt and Malzberg were discussing last week’s Senate hearing on Stand Your Ground laws, at which Martin’s mother Sybrina Fulton gave impassioned testimony. At the hearing, Sen. Ted Cruz dismissed Fulton’s testimony as “simply mourning the loss of your son” and asserted that Stand Your Ground laws in fact “protect those in African-American communities.”

The gun activist and radio host heartily agreed with Cruz. “Had she looked at the numbers, she would have found that as a percentage of blacks compared to a percentage of whites…” Pratt began. Malzberg finished his sentence: “The laws benefit the African-American community down there more so than they do the white community, you’re right.”

In fact, a Tampa Bay Timesanalysis of Stand Your Ground cases in Florida found substantial racial disparities in the application of the law, including that “people who killed a black person walked free 73 percent of the time, while those who killed a white person went free 59 percent of the time.” A national study found a similar disparity.

Pratt concluded that Fulton had it all wrong and “probably what killed her son was the broken family that he was forced to deal with. That’s often an indicator that a young man is going to have trouble, of either race, of any race.”

Pratt has previously said that Attorney General Holder is “racist” and was using the Martin case to “intimidate” white people into not defending themselves against “black mobs,” and even alleged that Holder and President Obama were using the case to bring about communism.

Gun Owners of America executive director Larry Pratt has been one of the most outspoken proponents of the popular right-wing theory that Trayvon Martin’s murder and the subsequent police inaction had nothing to do with race and that President Obama, Attorney General Eric Holder and others are the real racists for daring to talk about racial bias in the criminal justice system.

Pratt brought his argument today to the sympathetic audience of American Family Radio’s Tim Wildmon and Jim Stanley, telling them up front that “Holder is a racist.”

In fact, Pratt tells them, Holder is considering civil rights charges against George Zimmerman in order to “intimidate the rest of the country so that we don’t think about defending ourselves” against “attacks by black mobs on white individuals.”

He cites, of course, thephonyscandal surrounding two members of the New Black Panther Party who stood briefly in front of a heavily-Democratic polling place in Philadelphia during the 2008 election – the Justice Department eventually dropped charges against the unarmed member of the pair, provoking a Fox News-driven storm of outrage. Holder later told members of Congress that the phony outrage and comparisons of the Philadelphia incident to systematic voter intimidation and suppression in the Jim Crow South did “a great disservice to people who put their lives on the line for my people.”

Pratt, of course, takes Holder’s “my people” quote unrecognizably out of context in order to suggest that the attorney general doesn’t “belong in this country” and should move to Cuba:

“I really think the attorney general, as well as the president, are racist, and they look at the world through the prism of race,” he said. The president, the first lady and Hillary Rodham Clinton, he speculated, are in fact trying to exploit the issue of race to “divide people” and cause “turmoil” in order to ultimately “bring collapse to the existing order” and “build their own communist society.”

Pratt did see a glimmer of hope in the Zimmerman trial, however. He expressed surprise that a smaller percentage of African Americans believe Zimmerman was guilty than voted for Obama, which he argues means that “there must have been some pretty impressive evidence indeed to get five percent of those Democrat blacks to move from their normal Democrat default position.”

I really think the attorney general, as well as the president, are racist, and they look at the world through the prism of race. And it’s also an issue that they like to exploit to keep things stirred up. I’m sure you’ve talked many times about the Marxist theorist Saul Alinsky. And one of his chief points is to seek to divide people so that you can have turmoil, and so that you can bring collapse to the existing order, because it’s the communist view that out of collapse they can then build their own communist society. That’s what Saul Alinsky was all about, that’s what the Obamas are all about, that’s what Hillary Clinton is all about. You know, Hillary wrote her senior thesis on Saul Alinsky. She actually had met him not too long before he died. So, these folks that we’re dealing with at the top of our government are intentionally looking for ways to cause dissention.

And yet, something interesting. Blacks tend to vote Democrat, at least in the national elections, about 92 percent of all the blacks voted Democrat. And yet, only 87 percent thought that Martin was a victim, that he was not the aggressor. You realize that, even though that’s only a five percent difference, there must have been some pretty impressive evidence indeed to get five percent of those Democrat blacks to move from their normal Democrat default position to the 87 percent figure. I frankly took that as encouragement, even though I’d rather not have them 87 percent think Martin is the victim. I think we made some progress in this trial.

In what the Miami Herald is calling the “longest sit-in demonstration in recent memory,” a group of more than sixty young people called the Dream Defenders came to Florida Governor Rick Scott’s office last Tuesday and have not left.

Arriving at the Florida Capitol just a few days after George Zimmerman was acquitted, the group is pushing for a special legislative session to take up a Trayvon Martin Civil Rights Act which would repeal the state’s Stand Your Ground law and address racial profiling, the school-to prison pipeline, and more. Among the many young people in Gov. Scott’s office is Dream Defenders leader Phil Agnew, a 2005 graduate of PFAW Foundation’s Young People For (YP4) leadership development program, as well as eight to ten other current or former YP4 Fellows.

Agnew told the Miami Herald that the work is broader than their specific demands:

“It’s also about a paradigm shift,” Agnew said. “It’s about empowering the next generation.”

PFAW Foundation has been helping support the courageous young people at the Capitol in any way we can, from providing administrative and financial support – including meals – to sending video cameras to help document their experiences. Young People For Director Joy Lawson highlighted the sit-in in a Huffington Post op-ed and is leading a powerful photo campaign collecting statements of support for the Dream Defenders.

Together, we are showing the Dream Defenders, and the country, that young people are standing with them in this fight.

Gun Owners of America executive director Larry Pratt joined Steve Malzberg on Wednesday to talk about the verdict in the George Zimmerman trial, which he somehow managed to tie to the tragedy in Benghazi.

“They’re trying to use the race card to move against guns,” he said. “They really don’t want us walking around with a gun, able to defend ourselves.”

This mindset, Pratt says, affected Benghazi, where he claims “they withdrew armed guards protecting the diplomats in that town shortly before it was attacked” because “they just think being able to defend yourself is counter-productive.”

Right-wing activist Alveda King is not happy with the NAACP’s call for the Justice Department to pursue civil rights charges against George Zimmerman. In an interview with Steve Malzberg yesterday, King wondered why the NAACP “and all those other organizations who also support abortion, who also support the destruction of natural marriage and family” are upset about the verdict in the Zimmerman case. She concluded that they must be getting “checks and money” to “race-bait” and “stir us up into racial anarchy.”

Over 100 activists rallied in Washington DC today to call for justice for Trayvon Martin. The people gathered had another point to make as well: Americans are fed up with ALEC’s pernicious influence in writing pro-corporate legislation and pushing it through state legislatures across the country. Today, outside ALEC’s headquarters, we made sure we were heard.

People For’s Diallo Brooks spoke at the event, calling attention to role ALEC and the NRA played in setting the stage for this tragic situation. While racial profiling may be at the heart of this case, the laws pushed by ALEC at have hampered Trayvon’s family’s ability to seek justice, just as ALEC legislation has done to so many Americans.

Here are some additonal photos from the event:

People For the American Way also signed and delivered a letter to ALEC demanding that they disclose their financial ties to the National Rifle Association and desist from promoting "Shoot First" laws. You can read the letter here.

Tomorrow, activists and progressive organizations will descend on the headquarters of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in Washington, DC to protest the NRA-designed “Shoot First” laws that ALEC has shopped to state legislatures around the country. As Calvin posted earlier this week, “When politicians enact ALEC legislation that benefits corporations, real people suffer the consequences. The results are tragic:”

(Source: Data issued by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement)

Information for the rally is below, and pictures will be posted after the event.